Style Guide

& Not to be used except in official firm names and some top level links on the website

age Always use numerals. When used as adjectives before a noun or as substitutes for a noun use hyphens: 5-year-old boy, but the boy is 5 years old.

ALL CAPS Don't use except for acronyms

alumni and current students Names should be followed directly by degree program and year of graduation within parentheses: John Smith (JD '16)

Atrium Capitalize when referring to Law School's

Bluhm Legal Clinic Use on first reference, can be clinic or legal clinic on second reference.

capitalization of prepositions in titles See Chicago Manual Style (CMS) (15th ed.) 8.167 on page 366. This is a NEW rule and interpretation from CMS. Example: Learning From Victory

capitalization of organization names (including judicial) See CMS (15th ed.) 8.66 through 8.76. Based on this rule, lowercase references that use the more generic organization name: Center on Wrongful Convictions, but just center on second reference.

Career Strategy Center Use Career Center on second reference.

Center on Wrongful Convictions Not Center for Wrongful Convictions; use center or acronym CWC on second reference

course titles Actual course titles are uppercase: He teaches Contracts, or a section of Contracts. But areas of law when not referring to actual courses are lowercase: He teaches a course in contracts or specializes in contracts.

dates Always use Arabic figures, do not use st,nd, rd, or th (April 3 not April 3rd). (See months)

em dashes One space before and after (However, hyphens and en dashes do not have spaces)

e-mail Not email

Faculty names Use full formal name with middle initial on first reference, and last name only on second reference. In some cases may choose to use informal first name only on second reference. Either way must pick one style and stay consistent throughout the publication.

International Team Projects The name of an actual program; it even has an acronym, ITP, so it should be uppercase. In running text, the first reference would be the complete name followed by the acronym in parenthesis, and then subsequent references would just be the acronym.

Kellogg School of Management Not Kellogg Graduate School of Management. Use Kellogg on second reference.

LLM Not LL.M. (see degrees)

Law library Use Pritzker Legal Research Center

LawSchool Capitalize when referring to Northwestern but lowercase if referring to law schools in general or another law school.

legal clinic See Bluhm Legal Clinic

months PRESS RELEASES: When used with a specific date, abbreviate Jan., Feb., Aug., Sept., Oct., Nov., and Dec. Spell out when using alone, or with a year alone. When phrase uses month, day, and year, set off year with commas: January 2004; Jan. 5; May 15, 2005, is the convocation date. PUBLICATIONS: Spell out the month. (See dates)

Northwestern University School of Law Use in official press releases or upon first reference; use Northwestern Law or Law School on second reference. Never use NU.

NU Do not use, spell out Northwestern University

numbers Spell out numbers less than 10. (see percentages)

over vs. more than "Over" is used to indicate location; use "more than" when referring to amounts, time, etc.: He jumped over the log; There are more than 10 students in the class.

percent Spell out, do not use symbol "%"

percentage Use numerals, don't spell out unless the first word of a sentence: He is late 50 percent of the time; Five percent of the class is female.

periods Only one space follows periods

prefixes hyphens See CMS 7.9, #3 (page 306). According to CMS, it should be "posttrial" but we don't like that, so leave it "post-trial". (Also don't like coauthor because of three vowels together, so use co-author).

proper names as possessives See CMS (15th ed.) 7.17, page 281, so it should be Evans's

semesters Lowercase "spring" and "fall"

Tax Program Not Graduate Tax Program

titles of books, law reviews, magazines Should be italicized (different treatment than AP style); if regular text is italicized, then these titles are in roman (normal) type

Off-site links Any links to pages not on the Northwestern Law site (including main University pages) should open in a new browser window. To do this, click on link name and select "blank" in the dropdown menu under "Target" in the Properties toolbox.

pro bono No hyphen

Center on Negotiation and Mediation Not Negotiations

titlesCMS (15th ed.) rule 8.23, on page 318, "titles used in apposition": When title is used before a personal name, not as part of the name but as a descriptive tag (often with the), lowercase: the clinic director Tom Geraghty; Illinois governor Pat Quinn.

Lowercase and spell out titles when not used with personal name: The dean made an announcement. Capitalize title when used directly before a name.

U.S. vs. United States Use U.S. only as an adjective; use United States as a noun: U.S. Supreme Court; He is from the United States.